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Kaiser Health News

This year, the Illinois legislature was considering measures to expand oral health treatment in a state where millions of people live in dental care deserts.

But when the Illinois State Dental Society met with key lawmakers virtually for its annual lobbying day in the spring, the proposals to allow dental hygienists to clean the teeth of certain underprivileged patients without a dentist seemed doomed…

…”There’s always a struggle,” said Margaret Langelier, a researcher for the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the University of Albany in New York. “We have orthopedists fighting podiatrists over who can take care of the ankle. We have psychiatrists fighting with clinical psychologists about who can prescribe and what they can prescribe. We have nurses fighting pharmacists over injections and vaccinations. It’s the turf battles.”…

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The New Republic

As many as two-thirds of nurses, by some estimates, have said they’ve considered leaving their jobs over the past few months. Given the various horrors of the last year and a half, it’s easy to understand why: Stories of crowded city pandemic wards and medical staff sourcing their own personal protective equipment are impossible to shake. In The New Yorker, a nurse described ending most days by walking into her apartment, sliding down onto the floor, and crying…

…Jean Moore, the director of the Center for Health Workforce studies in Albany, New York, said that her department is waiting for better data to determine whether this particular crisis, exacerbated by the pandemic, portends a true shortage. “We suspect that some of what is happening in nursing reflects some broader issue around labor force participation,” she said. “What kids of jobs are doable, and which aren’t.” Anecdotally, she’s been hearing from colleagues that the staffing shortages are uneven. Hospitals in New York are saying they’re having trouble finding specialized nurses with experience in the intensive care unit or emergency department…

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Newsday

It takes a village to raise a child well, as the African proverb goes, and nurse practitioner Tia Knight-Forbes says her village is Amityville.

After working for local providers for several years, Knight-Forbes cut the ribbon for her own practice, ITAV-NP Family Health, in March in her hometown of Amityville. That abbreviation stands for It Takes a Village-Nurse Practitioner, and as a Black health care provider serving a Black community, it’s a message she lives by…

…Just 5% of physicians nationwide are Black, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. However, on Long Island the population of Black nurse practitioners is roughly equal to the Black population at 11% and 9%, respectively, according to a 2021 report from the University at Albany’s Center for Health Work Force Studies.

“As the state’s population grows and becomes more diverse, a diverse NP [nurse practitioner] workforce not only assures an adequate supply of health workers, but also supports the provision of culturally competent health care,” the report states…

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News Medical

A recent study conducted by researchers at the University at Albany’s Center for Health Workforce Studies (CHWS) examined the racial/ethnic composition of New York’s nurse practitioner (NP) workforce. Researchers examined key demographic, educational, and practice characteristics of the state’s active NPs.

Researchers found that Hispanic NPs were underrepresented in most regions of the state when compared to the Hispanic population in those regions. New York City saw the largest disparity between Hispanic NPs (8 percent) and the local Hispanic population (29 percent). On the other hand, in the North Country region, Hispanic NPs nearly mirrored their presence in the regional population…

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Newswise

…ALBANY, N.Y (Jan. 28, 2020) – A recent study conducted by researchers at the University at Albany’s Center for Health Workforce Studies (CHWS) examined the racial/ethnic composition of New York’s nurse practitioner (NP) workforce. Researchers examined key demographic, educational, and practice characteristics of the state’s active NPs. Researchers…

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University at Albany

ALBANY, N.Y. (January 18, 2021) – Research conducted by Simona Surdu and Margaret Langelier at the University at Albany’s Center for Health Workforce Studies found that children’s utilization of oral health teledentistry services in general dentistry clinics shortened their waiting period for specialty treatment services.

The study included 144 children from rural New York who had live-video teledentistry consultations with pediatric dental specialists at local general dentistry clinics. During the teledentistry visits, pediatric dental specialists provided the children with consultation services, whereas treatment services were provided in-person at the specialty detal clinic at a later date…

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Crain’s New York

Pat Kane, executive director of the New York State Nurses Association, has seen the pandemic intensify the decades-long fight over adequate nurse staffing.

Before Covid-19 struck, the Midtown South–based union of more than 42,000 frontline nurses made safe-staffing ratios a top priority for its members, who work in major hospitals and other health care settings across the state. The ratios regulate the number of patients that may be assigned to a single nurse…

…The department noted that in 2016, the Center for Health Workforce Studies, an academic research center based at the School of Public Health at the University at Albany, projected that if RN graduation and retirement trends remain the same, the supply of nurses would grow by 5% to 9% between 2015 and 2025, largely keeping pace with demand.

However, the department also acknowledged that other projections, such as those published more recently in the American Journal of Medical Quality, indicated a shortage of more than 39,000 registered nurses in New York by 2030.

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Cato Institute

The COVID-19 pandemic has made clear that government licensing of health professionals blocks access to care. Licensing gives state politicians the final word on allowable categories of clinicians, the education and training requirements for each category, and the range of services each category of clinician may perform. It reduces access to health services by increasing prices and reducing the supply of clinicians who can provide those services. It harms health professionals by preventing them from providing services they are competent to provide and by preventing capable individuals from entering or rising within health professions. By suspending such rules to improve access to care for COVID-19 patients, states have acknowledged that licensing prevents clinicians from providing services they are competent to provide….

..Right‐​skilling is critical to reduce costs across the spectrum of care. Academics and health care providers have proposed using right‐​skilling to reduce the cost of primary care by creating such new clinician categories as primary care technicians and community paramedics.6 “Psychiatric pharmacists … could help offset the shortage of psychiatrists by providing medication‐​management services.”

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Montana State University

An article written by health workforce leaders and published today in the New England Journal of Medicine calls for health care delivery organizations, educators and government leaders to “cut through bureaucratic barriers and adapt regulations to rapidly expand the U.S. health care workforce and sustain it” for the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The article was written by eight leaders of public and private research centers who interact with and study the U.S. health workforce, including Peter Buerhaus, director of the Montana State University Center for Interdisciplinary Health Workforce Studies and professor in the MSU College of Nursing. Additional authors are Erin P. Fraher, Patricia Pittman, Bianca K. Frogner, Joanne Spetz, Jean Moore, Angela J. Beck and David Armstrong

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Times Telegram

Mohawk Valley Health System CEO Darlene Stromstad said she needs all the health care workers she can get to take care of an expected surge in COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths in Oneida County and surrounding areas…

…Whether New York has a shortage of health care workers when there’s not a pandemic can be a question of perspective, said Jean Moore, director of the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the University at Albany.

“Do we have adequate numbers? Yes and no,” she said.

“Sometimes it’s not about counting the numbers. … They tend not to be well-distributed,” Moore said. “And many times, access to the underserved remains a sort of chronic problem.”

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